A former 40 year Atheist analyzes Atheism, without resorting to theism, deism, or fantasy.***If You Don't Value Truth, Then What DO You Value?***If we say that the sane can be coaxed and persuaded to rationality, and we say that rationality presupposes logic, then what can we say of those who actively reject logic?***Atheists have an obligation to give reasons in the form of logic and evidence for rejecting Theist theories.

16 comments:

In the case of Islam, the correct alignment would be fear based solidly in logic, reason and observation of empirical facts, including the writings of the Qur'an and the acts of those who believe in the Qur'an as it is written.

Please, do show why it's rational!What are the ods of dying at the hands of Muslims in the USA? What % of Muslims actually commit atrocity? How does these 2 numbers compare to other risks we should be worried about?

If you think the odds are quite reasonable, then you calculate them. But be sure to include the data of the EU and Britain, which would represent what the USA would look like with similar ratios, OK? And then take it to the limit, as the Islamics out-breed all others and come to dominate the population, as in Egypt for example, where Christians are on the slaughter list. It's interesting to note also that the Atheists in Southeast Asia get dismembered by mobs if they speak like you (and most Atheists) do, with the self-assured arrogance of self-righteousness indignation. In fact, why not head over to the Sudan, or UAE, or UAR, or Saudi Arabia, or Myanmar, or Chechnya, or Bahrain, or Indonesia, or Iran-Iraq-Syria-Afghanistan-Turkey-Yemen-Libya-Somalia-Mauritania-Mali-Chad ETC., and get all arrogant and self-righteous with them? Then you can measure their response accurately, rather than waiting for embedded cells and single Muslims to activate.

Here's a single data point: 1 Muslim kills 50 LGBTs in Orlando, 6/13/16. I haven't kept up exactly, but there's roughly one Muslim killing multiple innocent people per week in Europe, last week there were two.

So your question is, how many massacred people are you - YOU - willing to accept? How many? Let's say the average around the world per week is probably more than 100 slaughters, 1000 maimed, unknown numbers raped, enslaved by believers in the Prophet.

You are the one who is scared of Muslims, why don't you try to justify your fear with logic and reason based on statistics instead of anecdotes? Ya, it sucks that some Muslim guy killed 50 in a club, ya it sucks that Sweden had an attack, or Nice, or Paris, or London, etc... and ya, Islam is a stupid religion with lots of stupid followers (just like Christianity obviously) and ya many countries see a lot of violence because of that. But that does not say anything about the 2 things I asked you: What are the odds of dying at the hands of Muslims in the USA? What % of Muslims actually commit atrocities? Let me make this clearer: why are YOU scared of Muslims? why should I be scared?

Stan, I think the point here is not that Islam is good nor that Muslims are better nor that predominantly Muslims places are great. None of that is true. The problem is this irrational fear of Muslims, just because they are Muslims. That's not what defines good people vs bad people, and there are many more dangerous things to actually be worried about.

For instance, gun control highly correlates with reduction in mass shootings, yet any attempts to keeo the 2nd amendment enforced while reducing access to the mentally ills is blocked by the pro-gun lobby. The USA thus remains a much riskier place for anyone who might be the unfortunate victim of a mass shooting, a senseless murder, or a simple accident.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_shooting

In 2013, there were 73,505 nonfatal firearm injuries (23.2 injuries per 100,000 U.S. citizens), and 33,636 deaths due to "injury by firearms" (10.6 deaths per 100,000 U.S. citizens).

How would gun "control for the mentally ills" have stopped the ongoing Chicago southside slaughters? How would "mentally ills" be defined? The Left defines all of the Right as mentally ill, and vice-versa. Mental institutions have been eliminated due to the draconian use of the term "mentally ill". So what you have done is to create another Class of Oppressors: the "mentally ill". Not all "mentally ill" are killers. Why would you oppress all of them? Many of them are "good people", it's just that you are afraid of them. Right? So you would remove their constitutional rights, merely out of your own fear.

Immigrants who are adherents of Islam are ideologically attached to violence due to both the Qur'an and the vaunted Life of the Prophet which they are exhorted to imitate. Until they naturalize, they do not have any constitutional rights, so those rights do not inhere.

What you propose is (a) unconstitutional; (b) discriminatory; (c) based in fear of an inanimate object; (d) places human violence causation on an inanimate object; (e) ignores all incidents where the presence of a gun or other defensive weapon prevented harm.

Guns did not cause those statistics; people did, through either violence/hatred or incompetence. If all of these were, as you suggest, mentally ill, then we would also have to remove knives, ball bats, hard objects of all types, automobiles, trucks (the current ideological killer's favorite), all methods of fire-making, all chemicals leading to explosives, poisons, or toxics, including all otc medications, bleach, cleansers, ropes, strings, tapes, tools of all types, especially saws/hammers/screw drivers/drills/etc, tire tools, crowbars, broom handles, hot water, extension cords, electricity above 4 volts/10milliAmps, loose office equipment including laptops, printers, cables, lamps, all glass objects, all metal objects, all plastic objects over 10 mils thick, airplanes, bridges, dogs over 1 lb, plates and silverware, kitchen utensils and stoves. Much, much more can be weaponized of course, so that's a small start toward government protection of the stupid populace and mentally ill.

So we should get on with it. There's no constitutional right to own property such as the above... except that there is: Amendments II, IV, V, IX of the US Constitution.

Blake,You, in particular, should not fear Islam or Muslims. You should go live amongst them, say in Somalia or Iran or even Saudi Arabia. Those experiences would confirm your Islamophilia, I'm sure, and you could and should convert them to Atheism as a bonus. You could even visit the No-go zones in most european countries and even in places like Wisconsin. You could spout off to the Somalis there and see what happens.

Go for it, and report back on your experiences, OK? It ought to be especially interesting if you claim to be homosexual, so be sure to try that out.

See you when you get back. Looking forward to your report which will enlighten us all.

No the point is that You need to provide arguments as to why You are scared of Muslims, actual reasons not just anecdotes, and not how foreign countries are because I care about America and how we treat people here. Obviously you can't, so that's what we are seeing here, just racist comments based on an emotional response to stocking news stories that are statistically insignificant!!

After you and your pro-Muslim counterparts have filled the USA with Islamics, then this country will be just another Sharia-run hell hole. It's so obvious that only a narrative-slave would not see it. Islamics have already started electing Islamic legislators in Oklahoma and other places, and the first thing they do is to introduce Sharia based legislation, and the second is to whine about discrimination on the basis of religion, the third thing is to take religious discrimination lawsuits to court. When there are enough of them, they will be able to control the state legislation.

You and your Islamophilic buddies will see to that. What the USA needs is lots more of these friendly Islamics. They breed 2.5 times faster than Americans, btw.

Then you will understand what USAistan is really like under Islam and Sharia.

So keep importing them, that's the key to your comprehension of what real Islam consists of. It will take that, because you cannot comprehend what becomes of western civilization and what the loss of freedom for your narrative, for Atheists, for homosexuals, for women, and for Christianity is like under Islam. Your narrative will change, pronto. Or you could read the Qur'an, the hadiths, the Life of Muhammad. Or you could actually pay attention to world events. But you won't, it might blow a hole in your narrative.

You are so tone deaf it's unbelievable. How could anything I wrote here be seen as pro-Muslim!? I am saying I am not afraid of them, but You are! Your reason? Oh but but they do all these evil things... waahan cry me a river. They make up such a tiny % of the US and we can handle their stupid Sharia law and nonsense like that. Just fight that! Make sure the constitution is uphelp everywhere, for everyone. Is it really that hard to see the difference!? I am not scared of these idiots for the same reason that I am not scared of fundamentalist Christians like You! You have no real power as the institutions we live by are stronger than your silly religion, be it Islam or Christianity. Continue to be scared if you want but you have no reason for it except your own racism.

The overwhelming majority of Islamic terror attacks in Europe did not involve guns but the preferred weapon of choice for muslim terrorists are knives, bombs and trucks/buses. Check the terror attacks timeline:

and ya, Islam is a stupid religion with lots of stupid followers (just like Christianity obviously)and ya many countries see a lot of violence because of that

Absolute bullshit! Christian atrocities do not even come remotely close to the devastating crimes of muslim terrorists. In fact, Atheists are the only group that can rival Islam in terms of violence. Most mass shootings in the U.S were left-wing nutjobs.

Phoenix,The point is not that guns are this all-evil thing that we need to ban at all cost, and it was also not an attempt to minimize the atrocities committed by terrorists around the world. What Stan, and you now, refuse to look at is the prevalence of each type of violence: terrorism versus gun violence in my example. If you compare the two, you can see that fear of Islamic terrorism on US soil is simply not reasonable. The odds of being a victim of such horrible crime is, thankfully, extremely low, and the point is that it is much lower than being the victim of a gun-related accident, targeted murder, or random mass shooting. Yet, what do we see in the news the most, or as arguments from the far right movement in our country? Blame all Muslims, ban immigration from Muslim countries, fear the ones who are already here, etc... There is simply no statistical evidence supporting that point of view, while there are statistics showing how gun violence correlates with gun ownership levels. This is just an example... you could use a lot of different causes of deaths and come to the same conclusion: terrorism in the US is simply not a thing to be afraid of.

More readings available here:http://www.businessinsider.com/death-risk-statistics-terrorism-disease-accidents-2017-1https://thinkbynumbers.org/government-spending/false-sense-of-insecurity/http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-terrorism-statistics-every-american-needs-to-hear/5382818http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/03/us/terrorism-gun-violence/https://www.newamerica.org/in-depth/terrorism-in-america/part-i-overview-terrorism-cases-2001-today/

Relevant quote:"Compared to the threat posed by refugee terrorists — which the president's executive order is allegedly designed to curtail — the data suggest the typical American is:

6 times more likely to die from a shark attack (one of the rarest forms of death on Earth)29 times more likely to die from a regional asteroid strike260 times more likely to be struck and killed by lightning4,700 times more likely to die in an airplane or spaceship accident129,000 times more likely to die in a gun assault407,000 times more likely to die in a motor vehicle incident6.9 million times more likely to die from cancer or heart diseasePut another way, as frightening and disturbing as events like 9/11 are, an American's unfathomably remote chances of winning the Powerball lottery jackpot are many times greater than those of being killed by a refugee terrorist on any given year — and even higher compared to the odds of being killed by an illegal immigrant terrorist."

Travis,Your use of the term "gun violence" is an absurdity. Guns don't cause violence any more than trucks cause terrorist attacks in Europe.

And the issue is not fear in today's USA, the issue is the fecundity of Muslims, the decline of birth rate in American citizens and the open border policy of the American Leftists who can't garner enough votes despite their lies to blacks.

The future of our offspring is at stake. Even the slightest knowledge of history, say the enslavement of Spain by the Moors, would offer incentive to prevent that from happening in the USA. Islam has not changed. It is the same as it was when Muhammad slit the throats of Jews himself; captured and raped a 9 year-old; killed a groom in order to take his wife - the list is long and evil. Islam is evil, unless those things appeal to you. The Life of the Prophet, the Qur'an of the Prophet, the hadiths of the Prophet - these are the basis for Islam, and everyone seems to know it but the Left and probably you.

When Islam takes over the USA, gang rape and honor killings and internecine warfare will become the natural daily life here, just as it is in Afghanistan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Iran, UAE, Egypt, all of North Africa, most of South East Asia, Chechnya and the -istans.

Islam is a cancer that grows by breeding; freedom is tenuous as it loses its motivation to reproduce and kills its progeny in utero for pure convenience. Demographics will always control life-style and fates. Demographics are being weighted heavily in favor of an Islamic future for the entire western culture, which will disappear into 5th century barbarism.

Allowing Islam any foot-hold is proven historically to be fatal to the target culture.

A nation without borders is not a nation; it is a patsy. A sitting duck. A westerner playing games on his cell phone while stepping into an open manhole which he could easily avoid were he actually aware.

Argue all you want for ILLEGAL (criminal) entry into the USA; argue for how nicey-nice these criminals are; argue for how safe the USA is: those are the arguments of the enabler of criminal activity in a country without any thought for its future, without any concept of actual history including history of the illegal invaders, without any compassion for its own progeny (those it allows to live, that is).

When anyone trivializes criminal activity, the slippery slope is behind him. Any law may be trivialized and scoffed. The enabler becomes that which he enables.

An aside: Obama and Harry Reid opened the door to single party control of the entire US Government. Presently the Republicans have seized it under the Harry Reid/Obama plan. That won't last forever as demographics change under the open border policy. And, that will be useful when Muslims become the majority demographic, won't it?

How many generations do your websites calculate for the demographics to become favorable to Sharia? Or... perhaps they don't think about that?

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